DUCTLESS OFFERS EFFICIENT HEAT, QUIET AC IN MT. PROSPECT, IL BUNGALOW
Our homeowner in Mt. Prospect, IL was ready to really upgrade the HVAC system in her home. She wanted to get rid of her window air conditioners. And, she wouldn’t mind adding a little more warmth to her radiant heat system. The solution to both of these was a ductless mini-split system.
This would finally give this bungalow nice, even cooling all through the house in the summer. It’d also be a lot quieter than her noisy, clunky old window units. The new system would cost way less to run, too.
Unlike central air, this system also provides heat. This way, she could use her new setup in the spring and fall. That’s when it’s just a little too warm to really need full-force heat.
Our homeowner reached out to Compass Heating and Air after reading all our great online reviews. We get great reviews especially in the suburbs north of O’Hare Airport, like Mt. Prospect, Arlington Heights and Des Plaines, and we lived up to our reputation here.
Problem: A homeowner in Mt. Prospect, IL wanted to add better air conditioning to her bungalow. Her home had radiant hot water heat and window air conditioners.
Solution: Installed a high-efficiency Mitsubishi ductless mini-split system. The system is noiseless and uses much less energy than her old units. It also supplements her heating system
Choosing ductless or central air conditioning
There are a few points to consider when choosing ductless or central air conditioning to cool your home. Both are a big investment, but, the mini-split has many advantages:
- It’s quieter than central air
- It offers zoned HVAC to properly treat each room
- It costs much less to runThe first thing people notice about this setup is what they actually don’t notice: any sound! These things are literally whisper quiet. They only get as loud as 20 decibels.
Figure that people whispering and leaves rustling are 22 to 24 decibels. Then, consider that even the best central AC’s start around 55 decibels. That’s at least as loud as background music or people talking in a restaurant.
Next, it’s much easier to get the right temperature in each room. That’s because each panel, or air handler, works independently of the others.
t’s called “zoned” HVAC. Every area of your home gets a different panel. And, each panel has a thermostat to measure the temperature. If one needs to turn on, it does so without triggering the others as well.
In this house, we focused on three areas. We placed two designer wall panels downstairs. Then, we put a third in the guest bedroom. Finally, we installed a ceiling cassette in the master bedroom.
Now, our homeowners can control each area separately. You know how the bedrooms are always hotter than downstairs? Not any more! Those panels just work after the others shut off to keep the temperature even.
How does it all work? We’ll look into that next. And, we’ll see how this system also helped out elsewhere. Ductless
Choosing ductless or central air conditioning
The same mini-split that provided air conditioning all through the house also provides warmth! It works very nicely alongside this bungalow’s radiant hot water system.
The radiant system delivers heat through panels in the floor or behind the walls. When it’s cold out, the system is on all the time. That’s different from forced air system that uses ducts. Those are the ones that suddenly roar to life and then turn back off, over and over.
That’s a lot like what our setup offers. The new setup is also quiet and energy-efficient. But, it’s got more flexibility.
A lot of that has to do with how it works. Here, the warmth travels from an outdoor heat hump through tiny, flexible plastic tubing. We run that through the walls like electrical wire. We don’t need to do any major work to get it in there.
On the other end are the panels. These distribute the heat or cooling. They sit high up on a wall and are whisper-quiet.
Now, our homeowner can make her bedroom a little warmer than the other rooms at night if she wants to. And, she can let the rooms she’s not using a lot, like the guest bedroom, stay a little cooler while the others are warm.
All these benefits come with one more big bonus: using the panels is a cost-saver. It uses much less energy than traditional systems. That means paying less on utility bills. And, using it instead of the whole-house heating sometimes brings the cost down even more. Let’s look at how.
Choosing ductless or central air conditioning
The mini-split we installed in this bungalow is an Energy Star appliance This means it uses less energy than comparable systems to provide the same results. That saved our homeowner money up front and in the long run.
For starters, utility companies around the country now offer cash incentives for people to install energy-efficient appliances. In this case, we made sure our homeowner got in touch with ComEd. Sure enough, the electric company offered her a $900 rebate on her new system!
And, that’s just for starters. Replacing those old window air conditioners brings her bills down even further. That’s because the panels use inverter technology when heating or cooling her home.
This means the panels don’t need to be either off or on full blast. A lot of times, they’re running at a low speed, like a car on cruise control. That way, they maintain the temperature all the time instead of suddenly roaring to life when the temp changes.
This takes less energy than constantly course-correcting.
That also makes them more useful in the spring and summer. We call those the shoulder seasons, in between the peak times of summer and winter.
Those are the months when you usually just need a little bit of extra warmth. It’s when the temps just start dipping in the fall, or haven’t warmed all the way up yet after winter.
At these times, the panels come in handy. Our Mt. Prospect homeowner just uses them instead of the whole-house system. This way, her bills are even lower than before when it’s not freezing cold outside.
Are you ready to upgrade your heating and replace your old window units? Contact us, and we’ll design a system that’s perfect for your home!